


with blood and measure and reason and love

by Drownedinlight



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types, The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: F/F, Fix-It, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-30
Updated: 2020-08-30
Packaged: 2021-03-06 23:15:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,200
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26196994
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Drownedinlight/pseuds/Drownedinlight
Summary: Andromache of Scythia has seen gods before. When Quynh is taken from her, she calls on those same gods to aid her.
Relationships: Andy | Andromache of Scythia/Quynh | Noriko, Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Comments: 7
Kudos: 212





	with blood and measure and reason and love

When they take Quynh away, locked in the horrible iron coffin of a prison, Andromache wants to scream and never stop screaming. She does scream for some time. She wants to die and die for good like so many of the others she has lost – Hypolyta, Lykon, Hector. Of all of them Quynh’s loss shreads her heart the worst, for Quynh had seen her through all the rest. When they went, they had both thought it would always be together. And as she sat in her cell, the weight of loneliness crushed her.

It swiftly becomes a weight she refuses to bear.

When Nicolò and Yusef come for her, Andromache already knows her plan is a foolish one – if it should even work. Who is to say the gods still live, and if they did, why should they listen to her? What would they demand in exchange for her request? Andromache’s no prophet nor oracle, but she knows this: she will do _anything_ to get Quynh back.

The men protest.

“We need to get away from here,” says Nicolò, as they reach the city outskirts. “Far away. They will be looking for us, Andromache, and you most of all.”

Andromache looks him dead in the eye. “And if Yusef were at the bottom of the sea right now? What would you do, Nicolò? All I ask is that we try a sacrifice – wine if it’s the only thing we can get. I do not know if it will work, but it is the best chance I know of to rescue her.”

Blood would be better, but Nicolò is right. People are already accusing her of being a witch, and here will be people looking for them already. They must be as swift as they can, Nicolò is right about this as well, and so wine may have to do. 

Nicolò cannot think of a retort to her, but he blusters trying to protest against her.

Yusef has stayed quiet throughout their exchange and as Nicolò tries to reason with Andromache. At last he quiets them both saying, “There are things unseen in this world – angels, and djinn, and maybe even the divine. Andromache is older than us both, habib, and she has seen many things left invisible to us.”

Nicolò turns to him, considers his lover’s eyes and his mouth, signs and asks, “Is wine all that we will need?”

“An animal would be better,” says Andromache, feeling a knot catch in her throat as she tries to speak. “And Poseidon was always found of Bulls.”

They ride swiftly to a sea side town fair enough away from the courts that had taken Quynh from them so as to douse suspicion, but not so far away that they could not return again in a hard day’s ride. Andy wears a mourning veil and the upper class clothing the men purchased for her. She sits buy, letting Yusef charm a wine merchant, and Nicolò bargain for a bull, while she tries to think of words she has not heard in more than two-thousand years. Andromache thinks of Hector – the last time she had made this large of a sacrifice had been at their wedding feast.

They make their way to the seaside and clear away a place to build a fire among the sand and rocks and long grasses. Nicolò and Yusef go to collect drift wood, and as they bring it back Andromache builds the fire up and up.

“I am Andromache of Scythia,” she tells the fire as she builds it. “I was a warrior of the Steppe, a queen among the Amazons, the widow of Hector. I have fought Herakles and and survived the fall of Troy. I am immortal – and I request the aid of the gods.”

When the fire is large enough, and night has fallen, Nicolò comes with the bull, and Yusef with the wine. Andromache removes the fine clothes until she is only left with her shift and sharpens her knife. As she cuts the throat of the bull, blood seeping into the fire and over the sand, over the fine dress Yusef gave her, Andromache remembers every word of sacrifice ever spoken, letting it pour out of her like a font. Andromache speaks, and she speaks, and she speaks, until the words run out just like the life behind the bull’s eyes.

There are no astounding sigms – the sea does not rise up, no lights flash across the sky, the earth does not quake. Instead, there are simply six shadows where before there were three.

Andromache lowers herself to her knees, pressing her palms and forehead to the sandy earth. She hears Yusef and Nicolò move behind her and hope they are doing the same.

One of the new figures comes forward, kneeling before her and grasping her shoulders to raise up her face to meet his. “You have not aged a day,” says Herakles as their eyes meet.

“You have,” says Andromache. For all he is a god now, he has not the face of the youth that Andromache once knew. His is weathered, lines crossing his face, and bearded, like a black cloud streaked with grey.

Poseidon calls out, “Rise up so I may look at you.”

Andromache rises, and Poseidon grows closer, as does the other – Apollo, she thinks, for his hair is golden and the faintest glow comes from him, even as his sister moon watches from the sky.

Poseidon looks her up and down, his sea green eyes making a thorough study of the blood soaked, ageless woman. “What are you, Andromache of Scythia, widow of Hector?”

“I do not know,” says Andromache. The word “immortal” perches on her tongue, but she is certainly no god. They may take offense. “I fight,” she says, “and I bleed, and if I die, I live again. I do not age, I do not make scars. I had lived centuries, maybe a millennium, before Troy. I may live centuries more. I may not live to tomorrow.”

The three divinities study one another before they return to her.

Apollo speaks. “And if all this is so, why do you call on the gods so loudly in your prayers?”

“There is another like me.” Andromache swallows down the bile before it even dares rise. “A woman called Quynh. When they discovered we could not perish, a group of Christians locked her in an iron coffin and threw her into the sea. She will drown again and again in never ending death in rebirth. I could not save her. Please, I beg of you, Lord Poseidon, for you command the seas and all in them: bring her back to me. I would give anything I am able in exchange.”

“As would we.” Yusef’s voice is soft as summer rain but just as loud as the thunder. “Quynh is our sister in arms, as well as Andromache’s. We love her as well, though perhaps not as great. We would share Andromache’s burden of payment.”

Poseidon’s face is hard set, unyielding like a a wave ready to crash. “I was never paid for the wall I build in Troy –”

“Nor I for my work,” says Apollo, practically singing.

“–what proof have I that you will keep your word.”

There is a lilt to his voice Andromache hears that does not reflect the hardness of his voice. After all, you can always dive beneath an oncoming wave. Not so unyielding after all.

“Let it be known, my Lord Poseidon,” says Andromache, tilting her chin upwards to meet his eyes, “that I married in Troy – but I am not _of_ Troy. I am of Scythia. I am of the Steppe, and I know what it is to command the respect of others, and what it is to be humiliated. If you see fit to return Quynh to us, the rescue her from her unending death and rebirth, and I or my battle brothers fail to fullfill our bargain with you, I will take Quynh’s place in her iron coffin at your pleasure on the bottom of the sea floor.”

Nicolò hisses, and Yusef keens. They ache for companionship, even having one another, or perhaps because they have always had one another. To gain one sister back at the price of another would be an eternal pain at the back of their minds. But Andromache will keep her word, and so will they, so they need not be so concerned.

Poseidon’s eyes soften. “You love her enough for this?”

“I love her beyond measure and beyond reason,” says Andromache. She nearly chokes as she says, “I was alone, until I knew her.”

No one speaks for a great length of time.

Then Apollo comes forward. “Come unto us, you immortal men, and share your wine.”

Andromache turns to Yusef and Nicolò, who wear matching looks of confusion but do as they are bade. They bring forth the bowl of wine, and Apollo gestures for them to drink. Yusef drinks, then Nicolò, then Apollo. Apollo gives the bowl to Herakles, who drinks deep and presses it to Andromache’s lips. She drinks, and then presents it to Poseidon. Poseidon does not drink at first, but instead turns to Apollo saying, “You have a way of things, nephew.”

“Hospitality will not be denied, Uncle,” says Apollo, giving a delicate roll of his shoulders. “She speaks in earnest and with grace. Such things should be admired and respected, don’t you think?”

Poseidon snorts. Then he turns to Andromache, placing his hands on top of hers, and drinks down the wine. Even as he raises his head, he does not release her hands.

“It would be unseemly to practice the same way as the Christians, Uncle,” says Herakles, stepping closer. “Would it not be better for Andromache to serve at your pleasure in Atlantis where you make your home, and she would be of infinite better use.”

“Perhaps,” says Poseidon nodding. He meets Andromache’s eye and holds her in place, as if he is trying to guess the weight of her soul. “For now, I would make use of your skills as warriors. There is a camp where we train our half-blood children. Once every ten years, you will travel there and make yourself available to them for a full year. They would benefit from instructors such as you. Will you agree?”

“I will,” says Andromache with no hesitation.

Yusef and Nicolò echo her only a moment later.

Poseidon nods. “Then it will be done. The iron coffin will come to you here on the morning tide. Then you will travel to the Black Forest – I will alert Chrion. If you make it to Heidelberg, there will be a satyr waiting to take you the rest of the way.”

Andromache lowers herself, setting aside the bowl of wine to prostrate herself once more. When she arises, the three gods are gone.

“Now what will we do?” Nicolò asks.

“Now we will feed the fire and let Andromache bathe,” says Yusef, taking up a nice log to add on. “They took the bull with them – thank goodness. The first attracts enough flies.”

Andromache does bathe, washes her shift the best she can, and then gives up when Yusef gives her a fresh one. They gather around the fire and pass the night together, none of them sleeping. The sand grows cold underneath them, even as the fire blazes through the night. As the first rays of dawn begin to streak across them, they all grow closer to the sea. They see nothing, nothing, nothing across the whole expanse.

Then.

“There!” Nicolò points, and they follow his finger to something making waves in the water.

Andromache picks up her skirts and runs, runs right into the frigid water to meet the party there. Nicolò and Yusef race behind her, right into the break, whooping and crying. Naiads with finned horses – hippocampi – tow the coffin, and at the head of their party is a young man who looks so much like Poseidon, but has two long fins instead of legs. Triton, thinks Andromache – Poseidon sent his son to head the rescue.

Yusef draws his sword to strike off the lock, but Triton shakes his head. “I had better do it,” he says, raising his trident. The lock splits in twain when Triton brings the trident down, and they clamber to open it, raising Quynh out.

Nicolò presses hard on Quynh’s chest, forcing her to extract all of the water from her lungs. As Quynh begins to cry out, the sea party excuses themselves. Andromache only holds Quynh close, and Yusef and Nicolò draw around them, pressing tightly against them, the rising sun glinting off the sea and blinding them.

Though they rest and weep and rejoice together as long as they can, they dare not stay long in their circle of safety and love. The inquisition will have sent men to look for them, after all, and they are expected in Heidelberg. There, a satyr will lead them deep into the woods, and across a barrier so that they might train a generation of demigod heroes. Camp Half-Blood awaits them – it does not matter what was behind. 


End file.
